Lack Of Infrastructure Hampers Electronic Transactions

Many banks’ applications have not lived up to their reputation, with only a few fintechs coming to the rescue of Nigerians. The cash crunch which besieged the country for weeks had been made worse with the inability to consummate electronic transactions with ease as well as a complicated conflict resolution for failed transactions. This is as players in the fintech ecosystem blamed the lack of preparedness as well as infrastructure in the banking system for the lapse.

With the cash scarcity, Mrs Olajire, a wholesale trader said she has no choice to but to sell to her customers on credit as those who wanted to pay are having difficulties with transfers. Also, a petty trader, Mrs Adekunle said she is still struggling to recover a N20,000 failed transaction from her bank since January. “I don’t want to do any transfer again until the bank refunds my money, but what do I do when there is no cash and I i have to buy my drugs” she lamented.

With increased usage of electronic transactions, transfers had become cumbersome as well as Point of Sale transactions. Many transactions have failed with no resolution as banking halls are difficult to get into. Henry a businessman said he has over N200,000 in failed transactions with two banks.

“It is difficult to enter the banking halls, so I have not been able to complain. There is no cash, so I have no option but to continue to try. The banking applications are epileptic as one transaction would say failed and the cash would already be deducted.

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do transfer, it will go on my side and would not get to the destination” he lamented.

Last year, the governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefiele, had mentioned plans of making the country 100 per cent cashless. According to him there are enough infrastructures in place to make it possible.

“I can say from what I have read from online banking to POS to ATM, mobile banking, I want to say we have provided all the needed infrastructure that will enable us make cashless a nationwide journey”, he noted saying that all infrastructure that is needed to ensure this such as the CBDC, online banking, Payment System Banks (PSBs), point of sale terminals (POS) agent banking, mobile banking and ATMs have since been deployed to ensure the smooth operations of a cashless economy.